Freedom isn’t a gift. It’s not given. Freedom is earned. Our freedom was bought and paid for by the blood of patriots who believed in something bigger than themselves, an ideal more important than their very lives. Over the years, that same freedom has been defended against tyranny across the globe, tyranny which has, on occasion, attacked American soil and taken American lives. Again and again, men and women died to preserve the way of life you enjoy and so easily take for granted. You can love, you can tolerate, you can pray for peace, but if not for those willing to take a stand, to defend against tyranny wherever it extends its insidious tentacles of corruption, you would know no freedom.